Currently, a variety of satellite sensors can make high altitude (i.e., above the tropopause) temperature and pressure measurements. For example, many remote optical sensors can provide moderate daily coverage using emission measurements. Unfortunately, remote optical sensing instruments are generally very expensive.
Temperature and pressure profiles can also be derived from Global Positioning System (GPS) measurements using orbiting receivers of signals from GPS transmitters. Though accurate, they require satellite receivers and often produce slanted profiles. GPS-based temperature and pressure profiles are limited by the directionality of GPS transmitters and the occultation between GPS and receiver platforms.
The most comprehensive global temperature data are generated using local measurements from the weather balloon network. Briefly, the weather balloon network includes nearly 1500 launch sites around the world. Most of the launch sites launch a weather balloon from land twice per day. Even with this seemingly large number of daily weather balloon launchings, the weather balloon network is limited in terms of temporal and spatial coverage, especially over oceans.
Atmospheric refraction angle profiles can also be used to generate temperature and pressure profiles. For example, see Gordley et al., “High Precision Refraction Measurements by Solar Imaging During Occultation: Results from SOFIE,” App. Opt., Vol. 48, p. 4814-4825 (2009), for a description of how to convert refraction angle profiles to corresponding temperature and pressure profiles. Thus, an efficient and comprehensive approach to generating refraction angle profiles or mappings could prove very useful in the generation of atmospheric temperature and pressure profiles.